Last Wednesday, I presented our Board of Trustees with our October 2011 Accountability Pillar results. A quick review would suggest that Holy Spirit Catholic Schools is a good solid division. We received very high achievement and excellent overall in the areas of: Safe and Caring, Program of Studies, Drop Out Rate, Rutherford Scholarship Eligibility Rate, …
Category: Educational Updates
Oct 28
Spirit Sings!
Have you ever wondered what happens when you put a concentrated effort into choral music? Well, 12 choirs, over 400 students and over 1000 audience members certainly do… and its called Spirit Sings. Last year was our first division concert and it culminated with the recording of a CD of Sacred Music. This recording was …
Oct 23
Mission and Vision
This past week, we began our leadership development program in our division. It’s a program that we offer every two years, although with the impending retirement of over 60% of our administrators in the next 8-10 years, we may have to offer it every year. Our first session is always about mission and vision. It is …
Oct 10
What… another PD day?
Tomorrow, Holy Spirit Catholic Schools will be engaged in a division wide professional development day. Our entire staff of nearly 500, will gather at Catholic Central Campus East for the day. The keynote address from Dr. Bryan E. Kolb, a Professor at the University of Lethbridge’s Centre for Behavioural Neuroscience, will speak specifically to the day’s theme, “Gray Matters …
Oct 06
Supporting FNMI Success
The other night we had our first FNMI Parent Advisory Committee meeting of the year. We typically have three meetings a year and for the most part, have them in our large PD centre in our division office. Although our attendance at this meeting has grown over the past number of years we still have …
Sep 25
Transformation is a journey not a destination
Last week, I attended the transformation meeting for urban boards in Edmonton. These events are being held throughout the province and are sponsored by Alberta Education, ASBA and ATA. Although my first thought about gathering “like” boards was to mix the groups up, I found it quite refreshing to be able to spend a day …
Sep 15
Action on Inclusion
I began writing this article late last week while I was sitting in the airport awaiting my flight after attending the Building Capacity Information Session hosted by Alberta Education. The wait then and up till now has provided me the time to reflect on what I heard or possibly didn’t hear during the day. For the record, I’m …
Aug 31
2011-12 Faith Theme: Do You Love Me?
On August 30th, our entire school division came together as both a faith and learning community to celebrate. Our Lady of the Assumption School organized a powerful mass with music provided by exceptionally talented staff. Fr. Tim of All Saints Parish was our main celebrant with Fr. Fernando (St. Martha Parish) and Fr. Tomy (St. Ambrose/St. …
Aug 24
The Night Before Our First LLT Meeting
Tomorrow morning our entire Learning Leadership Team (LLT) will be heading to St. Michael School in Pincher Creek for our first meeting of the school year. It will be a relatively short meeting as we plan to head out to Castle Mountain for our retreat shortly after lunch. The LLT is made up of senior …
Aug 05
Leadership Day 2011
As I’ve previously written, I’m a neophyte to Twitter and this will only be the 7th post to my blog. I’m not sure I have the correct lingo and have much to learn but I continue to explore and more importantly use these medias in my work. This year, we have seven new formal leaders in …